My recipe for a better system:
A) Abandon the IMC rating
B) Strengthen the distinction between VFR flights (essentially uncontrolled) and IFR flights (essentially within "the system") to bring them into line with the rest of the civilised world
C) Enable the concept of VFR at night.
This wouldn't cause Timothy to stop whinging about his Eurocontrol charges but it would ensure that IFR flights received a service which was always worth the money and would provide VFR boys with the FIS they so richly deserve.
All we need then would be to redesign our airspace system away from the historically-based mess that it is at the moment, into something more like the US or Germany.
I think you're ignoring an important part of the equation.
D) Create class E airspace everywhere in such a way that all traffic flying IFR
is provided with an ATC service.
That's the way it works in the US and Germany. Why doesn't that happen? Because NATS does
not have the facilities or the resources to provide that ATC service over the majority of the UK. And if they can't provide the service, they shouldn't get the fee!